Every day Poets & Writers Magazine scans the headlines—publishing reports, literary dispatches, academic announcements, and more—for all the news that creative writers need to know. Here are today’s stories.
“For this community, everything comes from reading the books, because the book, it allows us to be able to go within.” Participants in the Free Minds Book Club, held at a jail in Washington, D.C., speak to PBS NewsHour about how sharing their reading and poetry helps them.
Meanwhile, the Minnesota Prison Writing Workshop is raising money by installing vending machines that dispense poems in bookstores across the state. (Star Tribune)
At the New Yorker, Elizabeth Strout talks about returning to the character Olive Kitteridge in “Motherless Child,” her story published in this week’s issue of the magazine. “She showed up with a force, the way she did the very first time, and I could not ignore her.”
Readers have nominated more than 170 novels for the Guardian’s Not the Booker Prize. The Guardian has now invited the public to vote on which books advance to the shortlist.
At the New York Times, Ivan Nechepurenko and Alexandra Alter examine the censorship of the Russian edition of Yuval Noah Harari’s book 21 Lessons for the 21st Century, which contains alterations and omissions that surprised even the author.
“I don’t think the great American breast pump novel has been written. We’re still waiting for that.” Helen Phillips talks to Electric Literature about how parenthood informed her latest novel, The Need.
As the new board president of the American Booksellers Association, Jamie Fiocco plans to offer greater support to small bookstores and develop a mentorship program. In the fall the association expects to announce the successor to CEO Oren Teicher, who will step down at the end of the year. (Publishers Weekly)
“Pity the poor semicolon, punctuation’s wallflower, wrongfully maligned and too seldom asked to dance.” Patricia T. O’Conner on four new books that chronicle the development of the English language, from dictionary feuds to the history of gender slang. (New York Times)
